Since the beginning of the industrial age, the global economy has required more and more fossil fuels — coal, oil and gas — to power growth.

自工业时代开始以来，全球经济一直需要越来越多的化石燃料——煤、石油和天然气——来推动经济增长。

It is increasingly clear, however, that China’s aggressive efforts to sell batteries, solar panels and wind turbines to the world is on course to bring that era to an end, a new report says. The Chinese dominance of clean-energy industries is “creating the conditions for a decline in fossil fuel use,” according to a report by Ember, a research group focused on the prospects for clean-energy technologies.

然而，一份新报告指出，中国大力向全球销售电池、太阳能电池板和风力涡轮机的努力正在终结这样的时代，这个趋势越来越明显。专注清洁能源技术前景的研究机构Ember的一份报告称，中国在清洁能源行业的主导地位正在“为减少化石燃料的使用创造条件”。

The report includes a sprawling set of data to support its claim.

报告引用了大量数据来支撑这一结论。

The scale of Chinese production since 2010 has driven the price of these technologies down by 60 to 90 percent, the researchers found. And last year, more than 90 percent of wind and solar projects commissioned worldwide produced power more cheaply than the cheapest available fossil-fuel alternative, they said. That cost advantage might have seemed laughable before China began pumping billions of dollars of subsidies into the sector.

研究人员发现，自2010年以来，中国的生产规模使这些技术的价格下降了60%至90%。他们指出，去年全球新投产的风能和太阳能项目中，超过90%的发电成本低于最廉价的化石燃料替代方案。在中国开始向该行业注入数十亿美元补贴之前，这种成本优势看起来可能无法想象。

“China is the engine,” said Richard Black, the report’s editor. “And it is changing the energy landscape not just domestically but in countries across the world.”

“中国是推动引擎，”该报告的编辑理查德·布莱克说。“它正在改变的不仅是国内的能源格局，还有世界各国的能源格局。”

If Beijing is trying to wrest the future of energy from anyone, it would be the United States, the world’s biggest oil and gas producer and exporter. The Trump administration has eliminated almost all federal support for renewable energies and has pressured countries to purchase American fossil fuels as part of trade deals.

如果说北京正试图从谁的手中夺取能源领域的未来主导地位，那就是美国——世界上最大的石油和天然气生产国和出口国。特朗普政府几乎取消了所有联邦政府对可再生能源的支持，并逼迫各国购买美国的化石燃料，将其作为贸易协议的一部分。

The falling cost of renewable energy, though, means that many countries, particularly poorer ones, have a strong incentive to reduce their reliance on fossil fuels.

然而，可再生能源成本的持续下降意味着，许多国家——特别是较贫穷的国家——有强烈的动机减少对化石燃料的依赖。

According to Ember’s report, the falling costs of energy produced by Chinese-made wind and solar installations have allowed countries like Mexico, Bangladesh and Malaysia to race past the United States in recent years in terms of using renewably produced electricity (rather than fossil fuels) in everyday activities like heating and cooling buildings or powering vehicles.

根据Ember的报告，中国制造的风能和太阳能设备带来的能源成本不断下降，使得墨西哥、孟加拉国和马来西亚等国近年来在使用可再生能源（而非化石燃料）发电进行日常活动方面超过了美国，比如建筑物的供暖制冷或交通动力。

Across Africa, solar panel imports from China rose 60 percent in the last 12 months, and 20 African countries imported a record amount over that period, Ember said in a separate study recently.

Ember在近期的另一项研究中称，在过去12个月里，整个非洲从中国进口的太阳能电池板增加了60%，20个非洲国家在此期间的进口量创历史新高。

American companies, who do not make solar panels or wind turbines at anywhere near the scale of Chinese ones, are at a major disadvantage. Chinese companies now supply 80 percent of solar panels and 60 percent of wind turbines worldwide, Ember said.

美国企业在太阳能电池板和风力发电机生产规模上远逊于中国，处于明显劣势。Ember指出，中国企业现在供应全球80%的太阳能电池板和60%的风力涡轮机。

China has pushed for dominance in renewable energy partly for economic reasons and also to protect its national security by limiting its reliance on oil imports. But the implications for the planet’s health could scarcely be greater. Scientific consensus has long been that a sharp decline in fossil fuel use is the surest way to lessen the pace of climate change.

中国力图主导可再生能源领域，一方面是出于经济原因，另一方面也是通过减少对石油进口的依赖来保护国家安全。但这对地球健康的积极影响却大到不可估量。长期以来，科学界一致认为，大幅减少化石燃料的使用是减缓气候变化速度的最可靠方法。

“For too long, emerging economies have faced what seemed like a stark trade-off between growth and sustainability,” said Suwit Khunkitti, Thailand’s former deputy prime minister. The Ember report “challenges that assumption,” he said.

泰国前副总理素威·坤吉提表示：“长期以来，新兴经济体似乎一直面临着增长与可持续性之间的两难选择。”他说，Ember的报告“挑战了这种假设”。

To be sure, some countries would not be keen to rely so heavily on Chinese technology for geopolitical reasons. And few developing countries have the spending capacity to install the kinds of energy transmission and storage capacity that has allowed China to transform its own domestic energy grid so quickly.

诚然，出于地缘政治原因，部份国家未必愿意过度依赖中国的技术。而且，几乎没有多少发展中国家具备足够财力来建设像中国那样的能源传输和储存设施，正是此类基础设施让中国得以快速完成国内电网转型。

When the world’s fossil fuel use will peak also comes down to the pace of that change in China itself.

世界化石燃料的使用何时达峰也取决于中国自身的转型速度。

China still burns more coal than the rest of the world combined and emits more climate pollution than the United States and Europe together. The country has not yet seen a decline in coal usage overall, though its total greenhouse gas emissions have reached what looks like a plateau.

中国目前的煤炭消耗量仍然超过世界其他地区总和，排放的气候污染物也比美国和欧洲加起来还要多。该国的温室气体排放总量似乎已经达到了平台期，但煤炭使用量还没有实现下降。

But last year, China met 84 percent of its electricity demand growth with solar and wind power, according to the report. That meant it was able to cut fossil fuel use by 2 percent, despite a growing demand for power.

不过，根据该报告，去年中国利用风能和电能满足了84%的电力需求增长。这意味着，尽管对电力的需求不断增长，但它仍然将化石燃料的使用量减少了2%。

Mr. Black said that decline in fossil fuel use was largely due to burning less coal to produce electricity. He pointed to a number of recent policy directives that have reallocated subsidies and production incentives away from coal and toward solar and wind.

布莱克说，化石燃料使用量的下降主要是由于燃煤发电减少了。他指出，近期出台的一系列政策已将补贴和生产激励从煤炭转向太阳能和风能。

China is still building dozens of new coal-burning power plants, he said, but instead of running constantly like many existing ones, they might be at full capacity only during peaks in energy demand. Meanwhile, the contribution of wind and solar to the grid was quickly growing, he said.

他同时表示，中国仍在建造数十座新的燃煤电厂，但它们不会像许多现有电厂那样持续运转，可能只在能源需求高峰期满负荷运行。他说，与此同时，风能和太阳能对电网的贡献正在迅速增长。

“Coal is increasingly acting like training wheels,” said Yuan Jiahai, a professor at North China Electric Power University. “It provides balance and backup while the clean electricity system gains strength and confidence.”

“煤炭越来越像辅助轮了，”华北电力大学教授袁家海说。“在清洁电力系统增强实力和信心的同时，它提供平衡和后备保障。”

China’s economy as a whole is increasingly reliant on the clean energy sector.

中国整体经济对清洁能源行业的依赖程度日益加深。

Investment and production in clean energy last year contributed nearly $2 trillion to China’s economy, a figure which the report said was around one-tenth of the country’s economy as a whole, or comparable to Australia’s entire economy. The clean energy sector grew at a rate three times that of China’s economy overall, according to the report.

该报告称，去年清洁能源领域的投资与产出为中国经济贡献近2万亿美元，约占中国整体经济的十分之一，相当于澳大利亚的整个经济总量。报告指出，清洁能源产业增速是整体中国经济的三倍。